Ingeborg Bachmann – Someone Who Was Once Me
BERLIN, June 2026
Directed by German filmmaker Regina Schilling, Ingeborg Bachmann – Someone Who Was Once Me is a documentary released to mark the 100th birthday of the Austrian poet and author, one of the most important writers of the 20th century.
Film Still: Sandra Hüller as Bachmann © Elliott Kreyenberg
Portrait of Ingeborg Bachmann in Poland 1973 © Johann Marte
In this unconventional documentary, Sandra Hüller does not inhabit Bachmann in a classical sense, but rather offers a playful interpretation of the writer’s final days in Rome. Hüller’s performance is a study, an approximation, attempting to capture the deeply saddened author through small gestures and habits like lighting one cigarette after another, brewing coffee, or writing. At times, she also embodies Bachmann’s physical pain, which the author suffered for various reasons throughout most of her life. The setting is an apartment in Rome, decorated to resemble Bachmann’s final residence in the historic Palazzo Sacchetti.
Film Stills: Sandra Hüller as Bachmann © Elliott Kreyenberg
Recreating Ingeborg Bachmann in a traditional historical drama is a risk that neither the director nor the actress chooses to take. Instead, we are given a carefully assembled collage of archival materials, photographs, and video footage from Bachmann’s readings and interviews. There are no dialogues and no narrative voice-over; everything is drawn directly from her books, letters, and interview statements.
Schilling’s collage succeeds in celebrating Bachmann on her centenary, making it painfully clear how much she suffered both physically and mentally in an epoch she was a hundred years ahead of. Yet, the juxtaposition of Bachmann’s profound observations on the human condition does not quite marry with the everyday mundane within Hüller's performance study.
Bachmann’s fragile, shy nature ultimately fails to emerge through Hüller’s strong presence. Instead, the result too often feels like a mere illustration of Bachmann, reduced to a blonde wig, cigarettes, and a typewriter.